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Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

digitalcameraworld.com

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Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#181

For the people kinda worried: this is a highly specialized piece of glass that is extremely complicated to manufacture at present and must, due to the laws of thermodynamics, not be 100% transparent. It's not going to allow surveillance through existing glass installations in any form, just possibly new ones if there's room for the support equipment and through the use of 4-5 digit piles of cash. Any camera glass lik…

You can't know how much it improves in a year, two, five.

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#182
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never understood bigger and more numerous camera bumps until I used optical zoom and took photos at night. Image quality with thick lenses is incomparably superior to that of thin lenses and 3 image sensors collect 3x as many photons as 1 so you don't have to hold the phone still for such a long time. Ideally the entire backside of my phone would be lenses

and your 1500€ phone still sucks compared to my 500€ DSLR, lol

It's doing a whole hell of a lot more and is much smaller. I'll take the tradeoff as a casual camera user.

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't wait until the windows in our homes plaster ads over everything every time we look outside. It'll sure be distracting when it's the windshields of our cars, but I do look forward to the legal drama when companies get sued for painting their "holographic" ads on top of the adspace other people already paid to pollute with their own advertisements.

I'm not sure where you live, but in many places there's strict city/county level ordinances restricting signs (Particularly lit up signs) and advertising. There's a reason people's backyards aren't littered with billboards. Anyone that's experienced a cracked windshield understands that this won't be going anywhere outside of some very niche and expensive cars.

> Anyone that's experienced a cracked windshield understands that this won't be going anywhere outside of some very niche and expensive cars.

Don't do the whole windshield. My car uses a bit of plastic on the dash to reflect a display. I love it!

https://i.imgur.com/jXfWf5b.png

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#184
So embedded micro light pipes? Cool idea. I wonder if it creates any kind of noticeable perturbation in the glass. Like if you embedded this in a window and were looking through a portion of the glass that contained these light pipes would you be able to notice them? Might be a problem for putting this type of glass in front of a display.

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#185
post #76

Yeah it sounds like a great option to place a camera invisibly in the middle top half of your screen so you can actually look a person in the eye when videoconferencing. No more weirdly looking down or to the side for everyone. I'm sure it can be used for creepiness as well but I see the benefits too.

iPhones solve the camera angle by changing the position of the pupil in software instead.

I believe Nvidia offers something similar with Nvidia Broadcast[0]. [0] https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/broadcasting/broadcast-...

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#186

It's a reverse light guide. We've been beam forming for a long time, it's unsurprising that the reverse is possible (imaging through a light pipe). The principal issue will be gathering enough energy. A well lit source like a bathroom mirror (mirror behind the light guide) could work pretty well I'd wager. If the light guide is too efficient then it will appear opaque, so there is a trade-off. I find "turns any windo…

As I posted below, Microsoft's Applied Sciences Group did something similar (I guess) back in 2011: https://www.microsoft.com/applied-sciences/uploads/publicati... https://www.microsoft.com/applied-sciences/projects/the-wedg...

I remember a friend on a team adjacent to the surface table team talking about them trying to do this when they switched from projection tables to tables with screens in them. As I recall with the projector based tables (the ones that looked like old cocktail arcade tables) I think they were using an ir camera to detect items and touches on the 'screen'.

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the everyday needs of the average non-enthusiast consumer, I'd argue that an iPhone is simply better than a DSLR or mirrorless - not just more portable or more convenient, but capable of producing reliably better images. Sure, the DSLR is the obvious choice if you're a serious photographer, but most people aren't serious photographers. If they buy a DSLR or mirrorless camera, they're going to use the kit lens and…

Phone-cameras produce muddy trash. Ever tried to make a good portrait with difficult light? That was the reason i began photographing seriously, because the photos i made with my phone on the galacon a year prior were trash. And yeah u have to learn how to properly use a dedicated camera which is why i only shoot with manual settings, for casuals phones are enough.

Phone cameras haven't stopped improving in the last couple of years. Your data might be outdated

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#188

For the people kinda worried: this is a highly specialized piece of glass that is extremely complicated to manufacture at present and must, due to the laws of thermodynamics, not be 100% transparent. It's not going to allow surveillance through existing glass installations in any form, just possibly new ones if there's room for the support equipment and through the use of 4-5 digit piles of cash. Any camera glass lik…

>For the people kinda worried: this is a highly specialized piece of glass that is extremely complicated to manufacture at present and must, due to the laws of thermodynamics, not be 100% transparent. It's not going to allow surveillance through existing glass installations in any form

If you're worried that your Airbnb host is going to use it to spy on you (which was mentioned in the article), unless you already scrutinize every nail hole, photo frame, electrical appliance, electrical outlets, smoke detector, etc, this doesn't open up a new vulnerability.

Pinhole cameras with a lens as small as 2mm are already readily available and cheap, no ones going to use an expensive "window camera" to spy on you when they already have so many other options.

Perhaps those that fear government surveillance or other well funded adversaries may have cause for concern, but few of us are in that category.

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#190
post #15

The article is poorly written, as it only discusses the camera component. Strangely, they chose stock images of holographic and optical displays, but didn’t mention that even once. The Zeiss site is a much better read: https://www.zeiss.com/corporate/en/about-zeiss/present/newsr... In summary: 1) ZEISS unveils holographic Smart Glass at CES 2024, both for displays/projection/filtering, but also another component whic…

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